Your Happiness Project: Do Something EVERY DAY.

I’m working on my Happiness Project, and you could have one, too! Everyone’s project will look different, but it’s the rare person who can’t benefit. Join in -- no need to catch up, just jump in right now. Each Friday’s post will help you think about your own happiness project.

A few days ago, I observed that it’s often easier for me to do something every day than to do it some days. I post to my blog six days a week. I take notes every day. I write in my one-sentence journal every day. Many people have told me that they find it easier to exercise when they exercise every day.

If I try to do something four days a week, I spend a lot of time arguing with myself about whether today is the day, or tomorrow, or the next day; did the week start on Sunday or Monday; etc.

If you do something every day, you tend to fall into a routine, and routine has a bad reputation. It’s true that novelty and challenge bring happiness, and that people who break their routines, try new things, and go new places are happier, but I think that some routine activities also bring happiness. The pleasure of doing the same thing, in the same way, every day, shouldn’t be overlooked. By re-framing, you can find happiness in activities like doing dishes or sweeping the floor, as well as your beloved morning coffee-and-newspaper.

The things you do every day take on a certain beauty, and provide a kind of invisible architecture to daily life.

Funnily enough, two geniuses whom I associate with the idea of the unconventional wrote about the power of doing something every day.

Andy Warhol wrote, “Either once only, or every day. If you do something once it’s exciting, and if you do it every day it’s exciting. But if you do it, say, twice or just almost every day, it’s not good any more.”

Gertrude Stein made a related point: “Anything one does every day is important and imposing and anywhere one lives is interesting and beautiful.”

So if there’s something that you wish you did more regularly, try doing it every day; if you do something every day, revel in it.

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This morning, a friend sent me the link to The Glow Movie – engaging insights and interviews with fourteen prominent women about overcoming difficulties and finding happiness. I just watched the entire trailer.

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I send out short monthly newsletters that highlight the best of the previous month’s posts. If you’d like to sign up, click here. Or just email me at grubin, then the “at” sign, then gretchenrubin dot com. (Sorry about writing it in that roundabout way; I’m trying to thwart spammers.) No need to write anything more than “newsletter” in the subject line.

Comments

[Liara Covert]

What an uplifting idea! As your readers share in the stories of other people who find happiness, then readers are more likely to recognize they already create their own. Your reminders of individual happiness projects inspire people to find reasons for happiness in all of their circumstances.

[Stephen - Rat Race Trap]

I believe you are right in multiple ways. A daily habit is easier to follow. I'm not sure your brain keeps a 7 day week calendar. Also I think innate personality traits drive, at least to some extent, whether one needs lots of new experiences to be happy. Just my observations anyway. Nice article.

[Ann]

As soon as I plan to do something EVERY day, I get all screwed up. I begin to feel guilty about it if something happens and I miss a day. For example, I've started a one sentence journal and my only rule is that if I really don't want to do it, I don't have to. (It's a journal about my kids and sometimes I don't want to think about the day we've had!) For me that's different than saying "4 days a week" and then I don't feel trapped into doing it and guilty if I miss. Clearly, I'm a moderator. Perfect for me is always the enemy of the good. That's the only way I ever got myself to floss, is by telling myself that I didn't have to be perfect at it, but I did need to try to do it most of the time.

Oddly enough, I brush my teeth (TWICE!) every day and feel neither trapped nor guilty. One wonders what the difference is between flossing and brushing? I suspect it has something to do with how early on in my life each became a routine. I don't know.

I WANT to be less of a moderator. I'm working on it. Any tips?

[nathanael]

I think what you're saying is true, at least for some who can manage to not feel constrained by it. It works for me anyway, and others in the project 365 photography movement (one picture a day, every day).

[Zyada]

In that vein, for those who have resolved to be more creative this year, I would like to point you to Thing-a-day 2009

Make one thing every day in the month of February; sign-up for the site ends Sunday, so you'll need to hurry!

[Zyada]

Website: http://www.thing-a-day.com

[beth vendryes williams]

I absolutely agree with your assertion about the importance of routine and, as Stephen commented, "a daily habit"!

In my work as an artist, it has taken me a long time to understand that. Painting and drawing grow incredibly for me, when I do the work each day! This has been reinforced by reading Madeleine L'Engle'se book, "Walking on Water" and is Twyla Tharp's premise in the book, "The Creative Habit".
The daily habit allows room and support for the creativity, so when you are inspired, you have the discipline in place to work with the inspiration. Although I occasionally still struggle with moments of rebellion against habit, I find I look forward to the room that it gives me to create freely!

[barbara]

Forgive me for the long post --but this is something I wrote five years ago after the World Trade Center PATH reopened. Your post on the beauty of routine made me think of it again:

For thirteen years my commute took me through the World Trade Center twice a day. On September 11th I made my usual journey at 7:20 a.m.; when the planes crashed into the towers, I was across the river in Brooklyn, standing in front of a class of 7th graders. Of all who have any connection at all to that terrible moment, I am among the thousands of lucky ones. All I lost was a place.

For so long, this loss seemed too trivial to mention, but with the reopening of the PATH station in late November, I found myself contemplating the experience again.

In those endless September days after the 11th, the fact that my route to work no longer existed seemed on the one hand completely trivial ,dwarfed by the enormity of the horror with which others were coping. But on the other hand the task of determining which subways were still working. and which roundabout route might be least time-consuming, seemed to require a disproportionate amount of energy and willpower. Like most mundane demands in those first few weeks, it felt both insignificant and overwhelming.

But then, even as the fear of another attack remained constant, my life began to produce a litany of mundane demands. I needed a prescription filled, shoes repaired, a key made, a kind of bread I loved, a foreign newspaper I bought weekly. My habits and routines were exactly where I had left them before the disaster, and they kept nagging me to feed them.

It was through their insistence that it occurred to me for the first time that my pharmacy had vanished, my bread shop, my bookshop, my newsagent. Each one of these vanishings came as a revelation. I would form the intention to do something and then I would realize I was visualizing a destination which had once existed under the World Trade Center. It was like possessing a perfectly drawn and detailed map to a mythical city.

Two years went by. I grew accustomed to the alternative routes, to other key makers and other bread shops. When I heard that the World Trade Center PATH station was reopening, I felt some anxiety. I had read about the design of the station, and I didn’t know how it would affect me to ride around the floor of Ground Zero as part of my daily commute. The experience that it has in fact given me is perhaps the most unusual and unexpected of any I can remember. Because the station is temporary and construction is changing everything daily, it is also a temporary experience and so I want to fix it here.

Every morning for almost the entire ride, everything feels just as it always did. But then the tunnel suddenly opens out and there we are, at the bottom of the pit where the towers once had their roots. “World Trade Center. Last stop” says the conductor.

So many of the dead came from New Jersey and so I know that I must have rubbed shoulders with quite a few of them over the years, and undoubtedly some of them were on the same 7:20 train from Jersey City that I took on that late summer morning. I knew none of them, but nonetheless it is impossible to gaze out over that emptiness and up into the sky beyond it without thinking of them.

I remember that so many of us swore that September 11th would change us forever, that we would remember what matters most in life. I think I appreciate this ride so much because at least twice in my day I am reminded. And it is not upon the great transcendent matters that I find myself reflecting, but upon the small and not very interesting habits and routines which thread invisibly through our days. When I lost the city that lay under the World Trade Center, I realized how many faces I saw in my memory, faces of people I had never formally met and whose names I had never known. And when I heard on the news that everyone on the concourse had been safely evacuated, I felt tremendous relief. All of us build day by day our little net of relationships with the people from whom we buy our newspapers and our morning coffee, and -- if we are on the other side of the transaction -- with the hundreds who buy our bread, who bring their shoes to be repaired.. In a minor key we even have relationships with those people to whom we never speak but recognize because we happen to see them each day at the same time, walking their dogs, waiting for the same train. It is only when this net is broken that we recognize the stuff of which our lives are made.

And so this is what I realize twice a day, as the tunnel breaks open and meets the sky at the World Trade Center PATH station. The subterranean and the celestial are, by their nature, never allowed to meet. But here they do. The surface of things has literally been removed. What is usually hidden is suddenly visible -- the beauty of routine, the connectedness of city dwellers, the thin ice of life.

[Meg Renicker]

Thanks Barbara, that was very impressive. It reminds me that even tho I am not doing well getting conscious daily routines incorporated into my day, there are some that I do anyway. Resentment over the boring mundane routines that leave no room for inspiration or the surprise of life has always hauted me each time I try to make changes. It seems like I'm missing the component of how rewarding routine can be.

I have asked myself occassionally if I want to be happier or do I just want to read this blog everyday and have someone try to talk me into making those little changes. I finally figured out from reading these articles that if I did X,X,Y, and Z that I would be more effective at work and have implemented them. Like, owning up to the fact that I like working, having a job and going out to work everyday. I like work. Not sure I wanted to like it. Maybe I have to go back to working on Deserving Happiness.

Meg

[Tracy Talbot]

You did an interview with a man awhile back who talked about patterns in daily living which really got me thinking about how I could improve the basic patterns of my day in my effort to experience more day-to-day happiness. This post fits right in with that idea. If I find something that I feel deserves to be in my daily patterns, and if it brings me joy (either immediately or indirectly/long-term), it makes perfect sense to add it. It is often a struggle to make that change, but as you've said before, I fake it until I make it. Eventually it's just another daily pattern, nearly effortless, and it brings so much personal return on investment. I'd like to add a big "Thank You" for your project!.

[Ben]

Another cool version of a 1-sentence journal is Memiary. It allows you write 5 blurbs about what you did each day. It's completely private, and a nice way to keep a journal

http://www.memiary.com/

[Christopher]

This is awesome. The quote from Andy Warhol sums it up perfectly.

Thanks for the pointers!

[Annette]

Like many other creative/artistic types, I used to really hate routines.
I've become a true convert, and realized that it is with daily routines that I can really find my freedom.

Now I only need discipline to apply them...

[Beth]

Hey,
Slightly off topic, and I may just be missing part of the site, but is there a list or an archive of these "Your Happiness Project" posts on here? I know you say that there is no need to catch up, but I would like to take a look at the other posts.

[Heather]

Beth, if you look on the right and scroll down there is a heading labeled "Archives"

[Eva Robertson]

When I read the title of this post, I sighed, with a little dread. I interpreted it as a call to "DOING", as in changing up your routine, as opposed to getting into your groove. Then I read the post and was heartened.

I do love the metaphor of the "invisible architecture of daily life." It summons up for me the idea of one's mind and habits being like a temple -- a quiet, beautiful and restorative place. And the longer one's habits of daily life have been an institution, the more historic and beautiful the building.

Of course, they say that doing the same thing every day doesn't help to stave off Alzheimers . . . .

[ferrers locke]

AIUI, there is some evidence from the nun study that doing the same things every day can help to stave off dementia - if, of course, they're the right things.

[HP van Duuren]

Thank so much for this post!

That's exactly why I have dedicated my 'Blogspot' to EVERY DAY
'Happy Inspiration', with all kinds of
Interesting and inspiring 'Daily Items'
on it.

I can't think for a better reason to
bookmark my 'Blogspot' as favorite don't your think? :)

So feel free to have a visit at:
http://hpshappy.blogspot.com

Also I have all kinds of routines like for example a 'Success Journal' (or 'Gratitude Journal') with freqently writing about the things that I am Happy about. And writing a 'Top 5' of most interesting things I am Happy about in a particular month.

BTW thanks for reminding me, I have to pick up this routine again, because I am slightly behind with it at the moment.

All the Best,
To your Happy Inspiration,
HP

[Anon]

Each day you do your daily thing, you put an X on a calendar:

http://lifehacker.com/software/motivation/jerry-seinfelds-productivity-secret-281626.php

[Jessica]

I completely agree that daily habit is the best way to integrate change into your life! That's why I'm doing a daily inspiration challenge to myself:

http://ayearofgames.wordpress.com

I've popped in sporadically through the months, thanks for sharing all of your tips and insights!

[HP van Duuren]

Talking about doing things EVERY DAY...,

I just read back your January 21th post about 'Keeping yourself Exercising' that definitely is something that I also do 'EVERY DAY' to be able to build 'Momentum' that way.

If you do it EVERY DAY it will get 'into your system' and it won't be hard anymore, infact it will FEEL GOOD!!!

For people reading this that like to get themselves inspired - or like to inspire others to go with them - to go Excersising and go 'Jogging' I have an inspiring 'Photo Collage' titled: 'Jogging On Gran Canaria' with photo's with the up comming sun that might inspire you to go Jogging.

You can find it at:

http://hpshappy.blogspot.com/2007/05/jogging-on-gran-canaria.html

All the Best,
To your Happy - Jogging - Inspiration
HP

[cynthia Geller]

it's a blessing to have the luxury to do anything always and everyday. for those of you who's time is not your own, i say the one thing you can do everyday is not beat yourselves up for perceived inadequacies. The freedom from guilt generates it's own energy and that's happy!

[Alex Fayle]

Yes - and for me the perfect example is dishes. If I do them every day it's a meditative moment. If I skip a day getting back into the routine is like "do I *have* to?"

[Jon P]

Every day works pretty well for me, but I allow certain days for easier or more enjoyable workouts—like going for a long walk on Sundays. If I miss a day, there's no regret. I just know that I'll have had an extra day for my muscles to recover. A boxer I used to work out with had a slightly different routine that also works: 3 days on, one day off, two days on, one day off.

[Wende Morgaine]

The link you posted to the Glow movie doesn't work. I think this:
http://www.glowproject.org/
is the URL you are looking for.
You are doing a miraculous thing by writing this blog. Thank you thank you thank you from the bottom of my heart! You change my life for the better!